Technical Field
This disclosure is directed to electronic systems, and more particularly, to interfacing devices in electronic systems.
Description of the Related Art
Operating speeds of processors used in computers and other devices has increased dramatically since the beginning of the personal computer revolution. Clock speeds of processors have increased from a few megahertz in the early 1980's to several gigahertz at present. Additionally, processors have added multiple processor cores to further increase performance. Further performance gains have been attained by the advent of the system on a chip (SoC), which integrates processors with other functions on a common integrated circuit die.
Peripheral and I/O devices have also undergone performance increases over the same period. However, in many cases the rate of performance increase has not kept pace with that of processors. This in turn can complicate communications between processors and such devices, and can in some cases produce system bottlenecks.